Saturday, February 09, 2008
Strange Wilderness
Guaranteed to be among the Worst Movies of 2008, Fred Wolf's raunchy stoner comedy should have been shot with a tranquilizer dart rather than released on Super Bowl Weekend. This send-up of nature shows starring Steve Zahn, Jonah Hill, Allen Covert and Justin Long has little going for it except for a few bong hits (by Long), joint pulls (Zahn, Covert) and a zany road trip.Unfortunately there are few laughs along the way as the crew tracks Bigfoot - unless you consider a turkey clamping down on Zahn's pecker for an extending bit hilarious. That's about as good as it gets.
Though I love stoner movies, I can't in good conscience recommend Strange Wilderness.
Posted at CelebStoner
Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Show
What if they held a comedy concert and nobody laughed? That’s pretty much the case with this disappointing doc, which stars Hollywood frat-packer Vince Vaughn and four comedians who barnstormed the country for a month in 2005.
Sans the star of Swingers and Wedding Crashers, few people would have ponied up cash for Vaughn’s faux-variety show. The lanky actor emcees and performs occasional skits. One with special guests John Favreau and Justin Long doing shtick from Swingers is the highlight, and it comes within the first 10 minutes. Another during a stop in Bakersfield features a tone-deaf Vaughn crooning alongside country singer Dwight Yoakam.
Unlike the talented Comedians of Comedy cast, the stand-ups here are mediocre at best. While Egyptian-American Ahmed Ahmed has the edginess of someone who’s endured the worst of racial profiling since 9/11, John Caparulo, Bret Ernst and Sebastian Maniscalco are fairly indistinguishable, with Caparulo’s crude cursing setting him apart as the least entertaining of the minor-league bunch.
Another questionable element to this whole undertaking is the tour’s timing. The first show takes place in Los Angeles on September 12, 2005, less than two weeks after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. A visit to a trailer camp in Alabama shows their concern, but perhaps the tour should have been postponed (or, better yet, canceled). Intended for a 2006 release, Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show is dated, vain and, worst of all, not funny.
Posted at TheLMagazine.com
Sans the star of Swingers and Wedding Crashers, few people would have ponied up cash for Vaughn’s faux-variety show. The lanky actor emcees and performs occasional skits. One with special guests John Favreau and Justin Long doing shtick from Swingers is the highlight, and it comes within the first 10 minutes. Another during a stop in Bakersfield features a tone-deaf Vaughn crooning alongside country singer Dwight Yoakam.Unlike the talented Comedians of Comedy cast, the stand-ups here are mediocre at best. While Egyptian-American Ahmed Ahmed has the edginess of someone who’s endured the worst of racial profiling since 9/11, John Caparulo, Bret Ernst and Sebastian Maniscalco are fairly indistinguishable, with Caparulo’s crude cursing setting him apart as the least entertaining of the minor-league bunch.
Another questionable element to this whole undertaking is the tour’s timing. The first show takes place in Los Angeles on September 12, 2005, less than two weeks after Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. A visit to a trailer camp in Alabama shows their concern, but perhaps the tour should have been postponed (or, better yet, canceled). Intended for a 2006 release, Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show is dated, vain and, worst of all, not funny.
Posted at TheLMagazine.com
